1. Field
The present invention relates generally to transporting multimedia content in a data network, and more particularly, to methods and apparatus for creation and transport of multimedia content flows to a distribution network.
2. Background
Data networks, such as wireless communication networks, have to trade off between services customized for a single terminal and services provided to a large number of terminals. For example, the distribution of content to a large number of mobile terminals (subscribers) is a complicated problem. This is especially true for mobile terminals that communicate using relatively slow speed over-the-air communication links. Therefore, it is very important for content providers to have a way that allows mobile terminals to easily and efficiently receive content and/or other network services.
In current content delivery/media distribution systems, a content provider provides content in the form of audio, video, multimedia, real-time, or non real-time content and other content types to a content provider network that operates to distribute the content to end users. For example, the content provider may provide high quality content, which has corresponding high data rates, to the content provider network. In certain geographic regions, specialized broadcast networks have been developed to receive and distribute this high quality content to selected end users by utilizing special hardware and/or communication links. In some cases, the specialized broadcast network may provide ten or more high bandwidth channels with which to distribute the content.
Unfortunately, these specialized networks are generally expensive and are provided over only limited operating regions. Over wide operating areas access networks typically provide users with much less bandwidth at a much lower cost. For example, a typical wireless network may provide only one data channel with which to deliver multimedia content. Typically, this data channel provides only point-to-point communications so that it is expensive and inefficient to deliver content to a large number of wireless users. Additionally, the bandwidth available on the data channel may be much less than the bandwidth available over the specialized broadcast network. As a result, there currently exists no cost effective and efficient way to deliver high quality content to a large number of users on a access network.
Therefore, what is needed is a system to create and transport multimedia content flows across data networks. For example, the system should operate to create and transport multimedia content flows from a content provider's network to a broadcast distribution network. The system should also provide a mechanism to adjust one or more parameters of a content flow so that it may be broadcast over the distribution network.